Whatto! Peeps.....
......filled with wild flowers that you could run through, laughing in a carefree manner......
.....with the sun on your face?
Well....
......where the bally hell have they all gone?
Apparently I'm not the only one to miss them....
...my friends the bees seem to have missed them too....
In the winter of 2007-8 more than a third of all bees were lost in the US & UK with 1/3rd of the UK's 240,000 honeybee hives being destroyed, adding to fears that CCD is a global problem.
The government recognises that the UK's honeybee hives - run by 44,000 mostly amateur beekeepers - contribute around £165m a year to the economy by pollinating many fruits and vegetables.
Although British honey only accounts for 10% of the 30,000 tonnes of honey consumed in the UK, other major honey producing countries have also been severely hit by poor weather and bee diseases. Argentina is the world's honey pot, producing up to 75,000 tonnes a year - three times that of its nearest rival Mexico. But Argentina has suffered a 27% drop in yield due to droughts and the planting of huge swathes of land with soya beans for biofuel - which is not a food source for bees.Previous theories for CCD have included pesticide poisoning as well as infection and mite infestation.....
....some suggest that radiation from mobile phones may be at least partially to blame, and that the proliferation of cell towers in rural areas may play a role.
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| TEXT: "I JUST FOUND ANOTHER DEAD BEE!..........AND ANOTHER!.........." |
FOUR YEARS!?
Bees are responsible for pollinating over 60 different types of crops.Up to a third of all our food crops!
Without pollinators, fruit trees wouldn’t give us their yummy harvests, and many other plants such as cucumbers, squash, watermelons and pumpkins would exist only in the history books.
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| "Wow! Mum! Look!.....Did we used to have VEGETABLES?" |
A team of scientists is concentrating on analysing gene expression from cells in the bees' guts because this is the primary site of pesticide detoxification and immune defence.
But the team's genetic analysis of the bees' guts failed to reveal elevated expression of pesticide response genes.What did show up in the guts of the CCD bees was an abundance of fragments from the ribosome, a structure which is the cell's protein making factory.
According to the researchers, this finding suggests that protein production is likely to be compromised in bees from CCD hives.
Previous research shows that the viruses that bees carry all attack the ribosome.Scientists say that mass bee deaths may be caused by viruses that disrupt gene expression.
The team analysed which genes were turned on and which were turned off in healthy bees and those from hives with colony collapse disorder (CCD).
"What they do is to work their way into the ribosome and instead of making honey bee protein they make virus proteins.
"So maybe what's happening is basically the ribosome wears out. So we looked to see if the CCD bees have more of these viruses than healthy bees. And they do.
The viruses in question include "deformed wing virus" and "Israeli acute paralysis virus".
The scientists believe that if a number of similar picorna-like viruses attack simultaneously, they may be able to overwhelm the ribosome.
"We now need to look for how multiple viruses might interact on the ribosome."
I wonder how long it will take for some scientist to say "You know what chaps?....
....our tests show that we should have more wild flower meadows!"
.....I just wish they'd hurry up..........
....because nobody seems to be listening to me....
.....and I CAN remember wild meadows from real life......
..... NOT History books.....
FOUR YEARS!
Tallyho!
Best Wishes - Lord Noel